Google's engineers say they have noticed unusual patterns of activity on its search engine which has given it a way to detect a certain type of malware. As a result, the company has altered the code for its search engine to place a warning at the top of the search results that a computer has been infected.

The malware apparently sends a small amount of traffic through a proxy. The company believes that a few million PCs may be infected, and since launching the feature Tuesday has warned "hundreds of thousands" of its users to possible infection.

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Process Explorer has always been one of the best PC monitoring and troubleshooting tools around. There's always room for improvement, though, and the latest version sees a very useful addition in the ability to track graphics processor (GPU) usage on Windows Vista or later.

You won't see this by default when the program first launches, but that's easy to fix. Click View > Select Columns > GPU and check the boxes next to whatever you'd like to watch: GPU Usage, GPU Private Data, GPU Committed Bytes, or GPU Shared Bytes.

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Streaming videos need an active Internet connection to play and even then you can get stuck with buffering problems. Not all videos play on mobile devices either, but if you can download the video you can move it where you like. There are various browser extensions and playback programs that enable you to do this but RealNetworks' new release -- RealDownloader -- is by far the simplest and easiest to use.

Once installed the program adds browser extensions that detect whenever you navigate to a page that includes streaming video content. When you move the mouse pointer over a video, it provides a pop up button labelled "Download this video". Click this to store it offline. If you launch the program itself you'll see what downloads you have in progress and your completed downloads. Select one to play it back in RealDownloader's own video player.

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As announced late yesterday during Apple's fiscal 2011 third quarter earnings call. OS X 10.7 released today. It's yours for 30 bucks, if your Mac has Snow Leopard and Mac App Store installed. Otherwise, you're buying something more first, either OS X 10.6 or a new Mac.

Concurrent with Lion's release, Apple also updated MacBook Air with Intel Sandy bridge processors and Thunderbolt ports. Lion ships on all new Macs from today. Lion requires a Mac with OS X 10.6.8 to install and a Core 2 duo processor or later. If your Mac is Core duo, you're out of luck.

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There is a lot of buzz about a recent set of tests by NSS Labs that show the Smartscreen reputation system in Internet Explorer 9 head and shoulders and most of the rest of the body above the competition in blocking malware on the web.

I think the results of the test are even more important than they seem, considering previous reports that Microsoft plans to make Smartscreen a base part of Windows 8. This would extend parts of the protection to any executable hitting the file system. This would be big news.

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Following its record-breaking third quarter earnings report yesterday, Apple on Wednesday took the wraps off of its latest generation of Macbook Air ultraportable notebook computers.

This round of Airs improves the processor speed of last year's generation by a fraction with new Intel Sandy Bridge chips, and replaces the mini DisplayPort jack with the new Thunderbolt I/O port, includes a backlit keyboard, and OS X Lion by default.

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LifeSize, the enterprise video conferencing company Logitech acquired in 2009, has made three major announcements today: a big acquisition, a new service, and a new piece of hardware.

The Acquisition

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Roku, the company who sold more than a million of its tiny eponymous streaming set top boxes without any physical retail presence has announced three new models of Roku 2, even smaller and more feature-packed devices at the same $59-$99 price points.

Three models of the Roku 2 are broken up in the same way last year's batch was. This time, it's the Roku 2 HD, which costs $59, has Bluetooth, and plays back resolutions up to 720p; The Roku 2 XD, which costs $79, also features Bluetooth connectivity, but supports up to 1080p. And the flagship device, Roku 2 XS which costs $99, has Ethernet and USB inputs, and comes standard with the new Roku motion remote, which is no doubt the killer feature of this upgrade.

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Apple's record-breaking fiscal 2011 third quarter is chock full of surprises -- in the results and from the earnings conference call. I learned 10 things, many of which surprised me, that you might want to know, too.

1. Mac OS X 10.7 "Lion" ships tomorrow. Apple CFO Peter Oppenheimer announced the release in passing, with surprisingly little fanfare. The software will be available for direct download to Mac users running Snow Leopard with Mac App Store installed. Cost is $29.99.

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AT&T, Verizon Wireless and T-Mobile USA announced late last year that they would be partnering in a joint venture called Isis, which would build a unified network for NFC mobile payments. On Tuesday, the joint venture announced that it has secured its payment partners, Visa, MasterCard, Discover, and American Express.

Each of the payment companies participating in Isis has been very active in the contactless and NFC-based payment fields for more than five years, so their participation in Isis seems only natural.

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Wall Street analysts were bullish almost to the point of insanity about Apple's fiscal 2011 third quarter results, with consensus estimates putting revenue growth at nearly 60 percent and income up by more than 65 percent, year over year. Apple did even better.

For the quarter ending June 25, Apple reported $28.57 billion revenue and net profits of $7.31 billion, or $7.79 a share. A year earlier, the company reported revenue of $15.7 billion and $3.25 billion net quarterly profit, or $3.51 per share. Apple announced fiscal Q3 results after the market closed today.

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Although CEO Stephen Elop has done his best to attempt to keep Nokia's 'Sea Ray' Windows Phone 7 device under wraps, it's not working too well. Yet another video is making the rounds on the Internet Tuesday apparently of the device at some factory in either China or Taiwan -- it's hard to tell.

There's not too much new here to see that wasn't shown in that original video. The device is apparently removed from a case that looks to be intended to disguise the phone inside, and booted up into Windows Phone 7. We get to see the fact that the device has a dedicated camera button unlike its similar N9 cousin, and that it appears to be running Build 7710, which has recently been released to manufacturing.

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At least a dozen individuals were arrested early Tuesday as the FBI expanded its investigation into the hacking group Anonymous. In conjunction with these arrests, raids were carried out in three homes -- two in Long Island, N.Y. and the other in Brooklyn, N.Y. -- as well as locations in California.

The FBI was not commenting on the raids directly but sources told Fox News that the raids were related to the federal government's widening probe of the activities of Anonymous. Arrests were made in California, Florida, and New Jersey. Charges against the detained individuals were not specified.

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As I reported yesterday, but want to call out more prominently today, a recent ChangeWave survey found that more Windows Phone 7 users are "very satisfied" than those with Androids.

Apple iPhone users are most satisfied, 70 percent in the "very" category. Fifty-percent of Android users are "very satisfied". For Windows Phone 7 users, it's 57 percent. But there's more. The number is a huge improvement over Microsoft's past. Only 14 percent of Windows Mobile users are "very satisfied".

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Well, so much for that Android exclusivity. But, hey, the iOS app appears to be for iPhone only. That's no iPad or iPod touch for you, bud.

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